Vintage Love (126 page)

“I don’t believe it!” Peg said despondently as she left to return to her own little room.

The tavern was much more brightly lit at night than during the daylight hours. Large lamps were set out in brackets along the back of the bar and also at intervals along the walls. At this time in the early evening it was also filled with many customers, most of them male, and was a much more lively place than Becky had imagined.

Mrs. Crown provided them with pink caps and big pink aprons. She herself wore the same uniform. As her husband kept busy serving their thirsty customers she went about the business of teaching the girls the various types of beer and ale and how to handle the spigots of each great barrel. Peg picked up the knack of serving a beer with a foaming head before Becky. But they both soon felt confident enough to begin taking orders.

Becky looked around to see if Davy Brown was there, but she saw no sign of the young sailor in the crowded tavern. The numbers of customers increased as the evening went on. Peg seemed to take to the work, and her good looks and pleasant smiles won her plenty of tips. Becky was also doing better than she’d hoped. The tips were often small, but they would total up at the end of the night.

Luther plucked her arm and whispered, “Let’s have that “Liverpool Girl” now. With all those extra verses, mind you!”

Blushing, she said, “Yes, sir.” And taking a stand at the end of the bar, she waited for him to call for order and announce her song. There was some good-natured applause, and then she began to sing.

It seemed to her that every eye was on her and all other activity in the tavern had come to a halt. Of course this was not true—Luther continued to quietly serve drinks, and even Mrs. Crown and Peg kept on passing out great steins of beer. But many of the patrons were giving Becky their polite attention. When she finished the song, there was a loud burst of applause and requests for an encore.

Luther held up his hand, “Later, gentlemen! After you have further refreshed yourselves!” It was his way of getting extra drinks from them.

As Becky went on serving the various tables she became especially aware of a table where a dandified young man with a grey top hat and coat sat. He was not only dressed more elegantly than any of the others in the tavern, but he carred himself with an arrogant air. He had a weak but rather good-looking face adorned by a carefully groomed, drooping mustache.

Whenever Becky brought a round to his table, the man made some suggestive comment about her body, making it seem a cheap compliment but insinuating more in his tone. Four painted young women sat at the table with him and tittered at his supposedly humorous sallies. These young women were coarsely lovely and also dressed much more extrayagantly then the other women of the area.

When she returned from serving the table for a third time, Mrs. Crown gave her a strange look. The big woman asked her, “Did that Alfie say anything evil to you?”

She blushed. “He said several things I didn’t understand. And he reached out for me in a nasty fashion.”

“Watch him!” Mrs. Crown warned her. “Alfie Bard is the prize pimp of the area! Those painted creatures at his table are the girls who support him!”

She gasped. “Prostitutes!”

“What else?” the big woman said grimly. “Poor creatures! He uses them and then rids himself of them if they get diseased or drink too much. He’s a real threat, our Alfie is, always on the look for new talent. So beware, my girl.”

“I shall,” she said. “I’m glad you warned me.” She was most worried about Peg, whom she had seen at the table at least once. She could barely wait to pass the warning on to her sister.

“You and Peg are straight,” Mrs. Crown said. “Anyone can tell that! And you’ll be no use to the tavern if you decide to change! I’d bar Alfie from using this place as a headquarters, but there are those among our customers who want a bit of what his girls have to offer. Luther thinks we should tolerate him because of that. But he makes my flesh creep!”

Both Becky and Mrs. Crown went back to work again, and she waited until she and Peg sang a duet together to a warm ovation before she took the time to warn her younger sister against Alfie.

Peg looked dubious. She said, “I can’t think he’s all that bad. It’s likely those awful girls who insist on crowding around him!”

“They work for him! Give him their money!” Becky said.

“I still think he’s funny and rather nice,” Peg said. “You can tell he’s a real gentleman by his clothes.”

Becky had neither the patience nor the time available to try and argue with her younger sister. She could only put this off until later and hope that Mrs. Crown would make Peg see sense. She kept working and the night went by quickly. It was fairly late when Davy Brown at last took his place at the bar, a smile on his bronzed face.

The sailor said, “I was delayed. Found a card game and couldn’t leave when I was winning and wasn’t allowed to leave when I began to lose! I’ll never learn!”

She smiled, “You missed my songs. Do you want a beer?”

He nodded. “A beer will do fine. I’ve already had too many whiskies.” He glanced around. “Where is that pretty sister?”

Becky said, “She’s coming back to the bar now.”

Davy looked and saw Peg returning with a tray filled with empty glasses. He watched her carefully and, when Becky returned with his beer, he told her, “I have news for you. She isn’t half as pretty as you are!”

“I’d be worried about it.” She smiled. “You’ll probably be telling her the same thing about me!”

“No,” he said. “I mean it. She’s attractive. But she hasn’t your looks or manner.”

“Thank you,” she said. And she noticed that Alfie Bard was waving to her to come over to his table again. She hesitated, feeling resentment.

Davy noticed this. He gave the dandy a bored glance and then told her, “If that fellow ever bothers you, let me know. I’d like to give him a going over.”

“He’s a customer,” she said with a sigh. “I can manage him.”

“Just remember,” Davy Brown said with a wink to bolster her courage.

She went to the table and noted that two of the young women had vanished, no doubt off to transact some business for the elegant Alfie. He smiled up at her in his knowing fashion.

He said, “You’re too pretty to be working as a barmaid.”

“What is your order, sir?” she asked quietly.

“Another round,” he said with a careless gesture. “My name is Alf Bard, and I can put you in the way of having a real life.”

“Thank you, sir,” she said. “I’m not interested!” And she hurried away the laughter of Alfie and the two remaining girls mocking her.

When she returned with the drinks he’d ordered, he tried to catch her wrist, but she eluded him. He gave her a wise smile and said, “We’re going to be friends, I promise. Even though you won’t believe it!”

She said nothing but once again hurried back to the bar where she served Davy Brown another drink. She hoped she would not have to return to the table of the pimp and his girls again.

Davy Brown broke into her thoughts by telling her, “I’d like to know you better. Maybe we could meet tomorrow. I’ve nothing to do but walk about the waterfront. I’m waiting for a new ship.”

She said, “I’m busy. My father died recently. We’ve only moved here today to begin this job. I’ve a lot of things to do.”

“I’ll be glad to help you,” the young seaman said.

She hesitated, “I really don’t know you well.”

He laughed. “Theres little to know. I’m the son of a schoolmaster in Kent, would you believe that?”

“Yes,” she said. “You talk like an educated man.”

“Thanks to my father,” he said smiling. “I’ve got me a fair education, but I’ve done nothing with it. I felt the call of the sea and ran off before he’d found me a post suited to my schooling. Can you see me apprenticed to a bank or law firm? I like the open sea and adventure. And that’s what I’ve found.”

“You may regret what you’ve done when you’re older,” she said. “The sea is a grim master.”

“Aye,” the young man said. “I know that, too. But I still can’t live without it. Maybe the day will come when I’ll be content with land and a quiet life. But not yet.”

She used the cloth Mrs. Crown had given her to wash up the counter in her area of the bar. She said, “I wish you well—whatever you do. You helped us get work here.”

“Then show your gratitude by letting me meet you tomorrow,” he pleaded.

She smiled. “Very well. Tomorrow at one. You can help me take some things I have to sell to the second hand dealer close by.”

“I’m your man!” Davy Brown said jauntily. “No one is more familiar with pawn shops than yours truly.”

Becky laughed and went on to serve another customer. By the time she was free again she was disappointed to find Davy Brown had left.

The customers were beginning to thin now, with only a few left. Alfie Bard and his quartet of tarts had long gone to attend to the business of the evening. Becky felt some relief at this, worried about Peg’s approval of the clearly despicable character.

When it came time to close and shutter the tavern, Luther Crown told the girls, “You did well! Continue as you have tonight, and you can work here as long as you like!”

“Amen to that,” his buxom, ugly wife said. “And now I’ll see you two safely to the house.”

She did, and later Peg and Becky sat on the bed in Becky’s room and counted up their tips. The total was just a little more than three shillings. The girls looked at each other in rapture.

Becky said, “If we do as well every night we’ll soon have enough money to make a proper start somewhere else.”

Peg surprised her by saying, “I don’t think the tavern is all that bad! I found the work fun!”

“You were the one who complained at first,” she reminded her.

Peg tossed her head. “I didn’t know what it would be like then. Did your sailor show up?”

“Davy Brown. Yes.”

“What’s he like?”

“Pleasant and has a good manner,” Becky said. “You’ll have a chance to meet him tomorrow. He’s going to help me gather up the furniture and sell it.”

“I’ll be resting most of the day,” Peg said. “I’m tired and I’ll be sure to have one of my headaches tomorrow night if I don’t get plenty of rest.”

She knew Peg had a lazy streak and avoided work whenever she could. That was why she was quite content to have her and the young sailor do all the hard work of packing the furniture and taking it to the second hand dealer. But she decided it might be best to pamper her younger sister and keep her contented.

Kissing her goodnight, she said, “Very well. I won’t expect you to help tomorrow afternoon. But you’ll miss meeting Davy.”

Peg smiled. “I can do that another time. Or see him in the tavern.” And she went to her own room.

At one-thirty the following afternoon Becky and Davy were busy in the flat taking down the beds and getting them ready to transport to the second hand store around the corner.

Becky hesitated over the half-dismantled iron bed and asked the young man, “Do you think we can manage all this by ourselves?”

“I’m sure of it,” he said. “We’ll take the ends first. Then the spring, with the mattress coming last. We’ll make a regular procession through the street!”

“Peg and I would never have managed alone,” she said, resuming taking the bed frame apart.

“She’s not much like you,” Davy told her.

“It’s probably good that we’re different in disposition.”

“I suppose so,” he said. “But as the older sister you have more responsibility.”

“I know,” she said with a sigh. “And Peg can be difficult. She has a lot of romantic notions of meeting some rich young man and marrying him. She sees herself ultimately as the great lady in some fine mansion.”

“I hope her dreams come true,” Davy Brown said. “Though I’m afraid few dreams do.”

She stared at him. “You sound so sad?”

He smiled again. “Maybe I’m beginning to see that I made a mistake in running off to be a sailor. Meeting someone like you makes me always want to stay nearby. To live on land like most people.”

“You said that day might come. But you didn’t sound as if you expected it to come so soon.”

“I didn’t,” he told her. “But the longer I know you, the more rapid the change in my thinking. I shall hate to lose you, Becky.”

She stared at him in wonder. “But we’ve only just met. We have known each other only a few days!”

His eyes met hers. “I knew when I first saw you that you were the one. I didn’t want to admit it. That is why I was late coming to the tavern last night. I thought I could stay away and forget you. I wasn’t able to!”

“I don’t know what to say! I like you! But nothing like this has ever happened to me before.”

“Nor to me,” he said with wonder in his voice. “I believe I’ve fallen in love with you, dear Becky!”

And he rose and took her in his arms. She did not resist him. The feeling of peace and security she knew in his arms was overwhelming. Was she also in love?

After a long moment he let her go rather guiltily and said, “Better get back to business! You’re not one of Alfie’s girls!”

She stared at him. “You know about Alfie’s girls?”

“Who doesn’t?”

“I’m worried,” she said.

“Why?”

“Peg thinks he’s handsome and funny,” she said. “When I tried to tell her what he was, she wouldn’t listen.”

Davy Brown showed concern. “She’d be well advised to listen. If that fellow ever gets her in his hands she’s as good as dead.”

“I know, that’s why I’m so worried,” she agreed.

The young sailor was reassuring. “She’ll hear more about him and learn the truth soon enough. I can’t see a sister of yours getting herself mixed up with that sort. You’ll see! It’ll be all right!”

“I hope so,” she said. “And now we have to start carrying things to the second hand shop.”

It was a tiring task which consumed the entire afternoon. The ancient owner of the second hand shop insisted on bargaining over every item, and Becky had to stand up stoutly for her rights or lose the honest value of the furniture. She felt exhausted when it was all over. She paused at the flat long enough to pay the sour landlady her money. The woman took it from her without thanks. But Becky did not mind, since it was a debt settled. There was only Mr. Longbeck, the undertaker, to look after now.